2017, A Hell Bound Train Of A Year (Part 8): Republican Words As Windows To Their Souls. Round 2

-by Noah

As I said in the intro of Round 1 on this topic a few days ago, the old saying goes that the eyes are the windows to the soul. Ah, but that presumes that republicans aren’t soulless creatures. Their words and actions indicate otherwise. I mean; can you imagine that any soul or that any soul would want to live in such a spiritually toxic body as that of Paul Ryan or Donald Trump?

For this round, I thought it would be good to deal with the topic of health care, since it was such a driving force behind the psychotic and sociopathic actions of republicans in 2017.

The following quotes are actual words from the mouths of these horrors.

1. Kellyanne Conway, White House Spokescretin:

Those on Medicaid who will lose health insurance can always get jobs.

And what jobs are those Kellyanne? What jobs with benefits? What jobs for people who are so disabled that that is why they are on Medicaid in the first place? This is classic Republican “Let them eat cake” stuff. Or, to put it another way, they’re saying “Let them eat shit.”

Nearly 1 in 5 Americans are on Medicaid. Do the math. Are there really enough jobs to cover that 1 in 5 of 325,000,000 citizens? How many of those jobs Kellyanne and her despicable ilk yap about will provide enough salary to deal with an onslaught of six-figure cancer treatment bills? Oh, and since Medicaid covers two-thirds of our people in nursing homes, please tell me, Kellyanne, what jobs will they be getting? Medicaid also covers 1 out of 3 American children. What jobs do you have planned for them, Kellyanne, even after your psychotic party has done away with child labor laws?

Conway’s statement isn’t just classic republican “fuck all of you” talk. The kind of person who would make such a statement is either so far out of touch that they belong in a home for the insane, or, they are just so filled with contempt for humanity that it was their consciously planned and thought out message to mankind. It also reminds me of Trump’s blissfully moronic Economic Council Director, Gary Cohn stating that a family getting a $1000 tax break could use it to renovate their kitchen or buy a new car. Really, one can remodel a kitchen for only a $1000? And, does that $1000 car come with wheels that turn?

Come to think of it, Kellyanne is already in a home for the insane. It’s called the White House.

2. $enator Chuck Grassley of Iowa:

Here’s Chucky saying he’s going to vote against health care for his fellow Americans even though he sees reasons why that “might” be the wrong thing to do.

I could maybe give you 10 reasons why this bill shouldn’t be considered. But republicans campaigned on this so often that you have a responsibility to carry out what you said in the campaign.

No, Mr. Grasshole. your responsibility is to do what is right for the people who voted for you even if they were stupid enough for you. And, since when has a politician held his or her campaign promises sacred? You are being so extremely disingenuous here that you should get some sort of award. I can think of several forms that award could take.

Obviously Grasshole doesn’t get any of this, and if he did he wouldn’t give a shit anyway. He’s got his health care and we pay for it. For him, as for most of his colleagues, it’s all about doing what is best for his corporate masters who keep him afloat with bribes in the form of “campaign contributions”. Keep in mind that when confronted with the stories about Roy Moore and underage girls, he laughed his head off, right on TV. They don’t come much lower than Chucky.



3. Señor Trumpanzee himself:

Let Obamacare implode.

Back in July, Trump had words, what he would call “the best words” after the $enate, controlled by his Republican Party, dramatically failed to repeal Obamacare, at least temporarily. It was a bitter disappointment for a party that aspires to be a party of mass murderers by taking way the insurance of tens of millions of Americans.

Republicans in Washington have voted over 60 times but they have failed. They’ve managed to hurt Obamacare, aka The Affordable Care Act, many times, often by denying it funding at the state level or removing funding for advertising the availability of the program. Only with their Christmas Tax Scam vote have they dealt it a serious blow. But the July failure was because there were 3 republican senators who were capable of mustering some level of temporary sanity and moral bearing. While the rest of the repug senators in the building fancied themselves as carrying on and building upon the works of people like Charlie Manson or the Zodiac Killer, Senators Collins, McCain, and Murkowski said no to the republican dream of “No Chemo For You.” That the final vote was a stunner is a measure of what republicans are.

Trump didn’t stop. Next he tantrum tweeted is demand:

Unless the Republican Senators are total quitters, Repeal & Replace is not dead! Demand another vote before voting on any other bill!

And, tweeted some overt threats (his caps, not mine):

If a new Healthcare Bill is not approved quickly, BAILOUTS for Insurance Companies and BAILOUTS for Members of Congress will end very soon!

Señor Trumpanzee’s threat against the insurance companies would sabotage not only Obamacare, but the entire healthcare industry. This is the action of a madman intent on creating as much mayhem and death as he possibly can.

It seems that no amount of American carnage will be enough to satisfy the dreams of the raging Trumpanzee. To top it off, a few days later, in New York, Trump spoke to a confab of New York police and made his implode statement to the cheers of the police. That was especially heinous when one considers that the police Trump was speaking to, like the republican senators who repeatedly vote against Obamacare, enjoy the benefits of government health care, not only for themselves but for their families, for life. So much for the concept of “protect and serve.”

4. Rep. Raul Labrador of Idaho:

“No one dies because they don’t have access to healthcare.”

When Labrador said that, it got me to thinking about other things that Republicans believe:

• Contraception does not work. No one gets pregnant from not using contraception. Only an aspirin held firmly between the knees is necessary.
• No one dies from a gun fired by a mentally ill person
• Trump is not a neo-Nazi.
• Putin, now that’s a leader and the Russian are our friends!
• There’s no need for having a woman on the panel dealing with healthcare.
• Some rape is legitimate.
• Jesus is coming tomorrow, no, wait, next week, no wait, next month, no wait…
• Voter Fraud exists on a wide scale but Election Fraud does not exist at all.
• All Syrians are terrorists by their very nature.
• There’s such a thing as corn oil so how can a flood of oil in a cornfield be bad? Pipes never leak anyway.
• Trump is not mentally ill.
• Gay conversion therapy is swell.
• Domestic violence should be strictly between one man and one woman.
• Republicans need protection from the spells of witches.
• There’s no need for a presidential candidate to release their taxes to the public.
• Tax cuts beget the tickle down.
• Ronald Reagan. Ronald Reagan.
• The fact that reports of Gen. Flynn’s activities have been reported in the news is more important than those activities.

5. Mike Pence, Vice President and Chief Verbal Fellator To Señor Trumpanzee

Every day Obamacare survives is another day America suffers.

Yeah, right. Asshole. No further comment necessary.

Scott Walker Gives Away The Radical Right's Healthcare Game... Oops

Congressional Republicans don't know quite how to respond to reporters' and constituents' questions about the TrumpCare legislation they just voted for. Some are following Trump's hubristic, bombastic approach of just flat-out lying and claiming more people will be covered for less money and get better healthcare-- just unsubstantiated nonsense that has been widely debunked. Buffalo-area New York Trumpist Chris Collins just flat out admitted he didn't read the bill and wasn't even aware that his vote cuts a program called Essential Plan that provides low-cost health insurance to low- and middle-income people who don't qualify for Medicaid. Over 20,000 people in his own district are benefitting from it. It's one thing for Collins to oppose the program and vote against it and then tell his constituents why; it's entirely something else for him to not even bother reading the bill and understanding how it impacts the life and death struggles of his own constituents but voting for it anyway. John Shimkus told a TV reporter, on camera, that he wasn't able to read the bill before voting on it because he was busy at baseball practice. (He and his family get government health insurance that has been exempted from the life-threatening provisions of Trumpcare, so... no worries. And that district of his is soon read. Trump won it with 70.7% and the DCCC has never even thought about challenging Shimkus.)

At a townhall meeting in Lewiston, Idaho Friday morning, Republican Raul Labrador, who voted for TrumpCare just hours earlier, drew intense jeers when he claimed nobody dies due to lack of access to health care. That's an incident that every voter in the district will have in the back of her or his mind when they vote in 2018-- not that the DCCC has any intention of ever running anyone against Labrador. They had a rot-gut Blue Dog incumbent, Walt Minnick, who Labrador beat in 2010 and Minnick so destroyed the Democratic Party brand in the district that's it's been irrelevant since then.

Greg Gianforte, the Republican multimillionaire running for the open at-large Montana seat against Rob Quist, has carefully tried to hide his support for the highly toxic TrumpCare. But... oops! On Thursday he told reporters he'd need to read the full bill before voting on it. A few hours later during a private conference call with conservative K Street lobbyists, the dishonest Gianforte felt free to say what he really thinks of the horrendous bill. "The votes in the House are going to determine whether we get tax reform done, sounds like we just passed a health care thing, which I’m thankful for, sounds like we’re starting to repeal and replace." The Times pointed out that "Even in Montana-- a Republican-leaning state on the presidential level, but which still elects Democrats statewide-- it appears no longer politically safe in the heat of a campaign to offer full-throated support for repealing Obamacare." (The DCCC refuses to help in Montana but if you'd like to help Quist beat Gianforte, you can do it here.)

And then you've gotten very vulnerable crackpot Martha McSally in the Tucson area (AZ-02). Hillary beat Trump in her district last year 49.6-44.7%. Local Democrats are trying to recruit state Rep (and surgeon) Randy Friese to run against her. She didn't help herself by voting for the very unpopular TrumpCare and, as Jim Nintzel reported in the Tucson's weekly paper, The Range, "After declining to inform the public of where she stands on the Zombie Trumpcare bill, it appears that Congreswoman Martha McSally (R-AZ02) is fully behind it, according to AP reporter Erica Werner, who reports that McSally told her GOP colleagues it was time to get this 'fucking thing' done."

But most Republicans are just sticking to the focus-group tested talking points Paul Ryan's office sent out, the lies about how great the bill is. One of those lies, which was puked out last week 2 days in row on Chris Hayes' show by Republican leaders, first Tom Cole (OK) and then Mike Burgess (TX), is that "oh, no one's going to use those silly waivers that kill preexisting condition protections-- how'd that get in there anyway? Besides, the Senate will kill it. Doesn't mean a thing--zip... nothing, nada, zero... less than zero."

Hours later, Todd Richmond, reporting for the Associated Press: Scott Walker would consider seeking waiver to let health insurers raise premiums in Wisconsin. Embarrassing. But far more an expression of where Republican ideologues are on this than Paul Ryan, Kevin McCarthy, Tom Cole or Michael Burgess will ever let on.

Gov. Scott Walker said Friday that he would consider seeking a waiver to let insurers raise premiums for people with pre-existing medical conditions if the House Republicans’ health care plan becomes law... Walker, a Republican, told reporters that he would consider seeking such a waiver, saying Wisconsin has run high-risk pools well in the past.

...According to the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit organization that tracks national health issues, about 852,000 non-elderly Wisconsin residents had pre-existing conditions in 2015. That’s a quarter of the state’s non-elderly population.

...Assembly Minority Leader Peter Barca, D-Kenosha, said he was disappointed that Walker is ready to sacrifice health care coverage for thousands of Wisconsin residents.

“We need to make health insurance more affordable for everyone, not penalize people who get sick or are born with a serious health concern,” Barca said.

Senate Minority Leader Jennifer Shilling, D-La Crosse, said in an email that she was “shocked” that Walker would even entertain the idea of raising premiums on families with pre-existing conditions.

Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy, a doctor and a former Democrat, has made quite the splash lately by telling CNN that for TrumpCare to pass the Senate it must pass the Jimmy Kimmel Test.

Jimmy Kimmel's tearful monologue about his infant son's heart surgery struck a cord with at least one member of Congress.

Republican Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy said Friday that he's basing his support on a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare on "the Jimmy Kimmel test."

"I ask, Does it pass the Jimmy Kimmel test?" Cassidy told CNN. "Would the child born with a congenital heart disease be able to get everything she or he would need in that first year of life ... That they would receive all of the services even if they go over a certain amount?"

TrumpCare doesn't even come close.

What Makes The Far Right Fringe In Congress So... Difficult?

I suppose it's conceivable that if the hacks in the GOP Establishment drive Trump out of the presidential race-- something they are very much trying to do-- he could revert to being a Democrat and even endorse Hillary Clinton. He certainly hasn't been as harsh towards her as he's been towards Jeb and some of the other Republicans. He wouldn't be the first to wash his hands of the cracking-up, dysfunctional party. Hey, except for the dynastic ties, I could imagine Jeb doing the same thing-- just washing his hands of the crackpots and becoming a conservaDem like his vile, opportunistic Florida amigos Charlie Crist and Patrick Murphy. But one Bushite who has already quit the GOP is economist Ben Bernanke, George W. Bush's Fed Chairman. A lifelong Jewish Republican, always a sketchy proposition under any circumstances, Bernanke wrote in his new book that he had finally had it with the off-the-rails party.

In one of the more revealing passages of his just-published book The Courage to Act, the former chairman of the US Federal Reserve lays out his experience with Republican lawmakers during the twin financial and economic crises that dominated his term as the head of the world’s most important central bank. Continual run-ins with hard-right Republicans-- such as noted Fed critic Ron Paul, the former Texas congressman-- gradually pushed him away from the party that first put him in charge of the Fed in 2006. (He was nominated for the job by president George W. Bush, for whom Bernanke served as head of the White House Council of Economic Advisors.)

“[T]he increasing hostility of the Republicans to the Fed and to me personally troubled me, particularly since I had been appointed by a Republican president who had supported our actions during the crisis. I tried to listen carefully and accept thoughtful criticisms. But it seemed to me that the crisis had helped to radicalize large parts of the Republican Party,” Bernanke writes on page 432... [T]he former Princeton economics professor said he had “lost patience with Republicans’ susceptibility to the know-nothing-ism of the far right. I didn’t leave the Republican Party. I felt that the party left me.”

And it's that part of the GOP, and the turmoil and dysfunction it has engendered, that Tim Dickinson recently wrote about in Rolling Stone. "Composed of nearly 40 of the most committed ideologues in the House," he wrote, "the Freedom Caucus has a simple mission: to get GOP leadership to deliver on the extreme, anti-government and social-conservative rhetoric that nearly all Republicans spout to get elected... For Freedom Caucus members, careers in Washington are not defined by incremental legislative progress, but by a chest-beating performance of red-state identity. Winning is subordinate to fighting-- a dynamic that leads members to reverse Ronald Reagan's famous admonition: 'I'd rather get 80 percent of what I want than go over a cliff with my flags flying.'" And Dickinson writes that they're not as stupid or as crazy as they're made out to be in the media.

[T]here's little lunatic about this fringe. The Freedom Caucus features whip-smart politicians who know how to tell it plain to the folks back home-- but may prefer to keep their book-learning on the down-low. Take Rep. Tim Huelskamp. The third-term Kansan sports a buzz cut and a goatee and has the aw-shucks bearing of farmhand-gone-to-Washington. What he doesn't advertise is the political-science doctorate he earned at American University. "Please don't put this in the story," he says with a self-deprecating smile, "but my Ph.D. studies include public administration-- organizational theory."

...We most often think of the Tea Party in opposition to the Obama presidency. In fact, the seeds of division in the modern GOP were sown late in the Bush administration. This anti-establishment movement was born of hard-right furor over GOP government intervention in the economy-- including the bank and automaker bailouts-- following years of K Street corruption and deficit-bloating social spending.

Freedom Caucus members define themselves less in opposition to Democrats than to "establishment" Republicans-- politicians they see as quick to betray their voters, and subservient to K Street and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which represents big business in Washington. It's a view articulated by their Senate co-conspirator, Ted Cruz of Texas, who inveighs against a "Washington Cartel" of "lobbyists and career politicians" that "favors giant corporations over taxpayers." ... They serve blood-red districts-- "homogenous echo chambers," says Norman Ornstein, the American Enterprise Institute scholar who wrote the book on congressional dysfunction, It's Even Worse Than It Looks.

Their districts are typically composed of far-flung suburbs, exurbs and rural communities, sometimes with a third- or fourth-tier city-- Grand Rapids, Michigan-- thrown in. Economically, these districts fare slightly better than average: Their voters are hanging on in the middle class but hardly thriving, with a median household income of $54,000, just $1,000 above average.

The defining characteristic of these districts is race-- they are 83 percent white, or nearly 10 percentage points higher than the national average. That demography is reflected in the makeup of the Freedom Caucus itself. With the prominent exceptions of a woman named Cynthia and a man named Raúl, these are all white men.

The Freedom Caucus acts like a third party in Washington because the political fates of its members are not yoked to the national GOP. Their districts rate R+13, according to Cook Political Report data crunched by Rolling Stone. This means their districts vote 13 percent more Republican than the nation as a whole-- and are nearly a third more partisan than the median GOP seat (R+10).

When election season rolls around, these politicians don't fear moderate Democrats-- they are only threatened by even more right-wing Republicans in a primary fight. Instead of seeking to make inroads with Hispanics or independent women, their political imperative is to serve up red meat to furious constituents who say they want "their country back."

The purpose of the Freedom Caucus, [Idaho's Raúl] Labrador says, is to hold party leadership's feet to the fire of the activist base. All Republicans-- establishment and insurgent alike-- vow they'll combat "out of control" government spending, fight for small business and stand tall for conservative social values. But the Tea Party congressmen are convinced that few members of the GOP are truly committed. "Once they get here," Labrador says, "they reject those things."

Labrador views his establishment colleagues as corrupt-- selling out small-government principles for PAC donations-- or, at best, mindless: "Any monkey can do what we do here, if all we're going to do is what our leadership tells us to do." He isn't bothered by being labeled an obstructionist: "When we stop bad legislation, it's just as functional as when you pass good legislation." And he couldn't care less if you think he's not a GOP team player: "I came here to represent my constituents," he tells Rolling Stone, "not the party."

Get Labrador rolling, and he reveals open contempt for GOP leadership: Contrasting the competence of Boehner and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy to Nancy Pelosi, Labrador insists, "She's smarter than our leaders." He lets those treasonable words hang in the air for a moment before taking the same swipe at Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell: "And so is Harry Reid."

In his unvarnished attacks on GOP leadership, Labrador echoes Cruz, the Texan who led the 2013 government-shutdown fight from the upper chamber. The senator's sway with the Tortilla Coast gang has led even top House Democrats to dub him "Speaker Cruz."

Cruz is an imperfect populist. A silver-tongued Princeton debater and Harvard-educated superlawyer, he is married to a Goldman Sachs banker. His bread has been buttered by the same Wall Street bailouts he denounces. Cruz's political patron is a billionaire hedge-fund manager, Robert Mercer, whose firm has been accused by the Senate of $6 billion in tax avoidance-- casting a less virtuous light on the senator's campaign to "abolish the IRS."

But Cruz connects with the Tea Party in his denunciation of the Kabuki theater of the GOP establishment-- wherein the party stages "show votes" of opposition to appease the party base, while stage-managing a process in which Obamacare gets funded or the debt ceiling rises.

Cruz doesn't see pragmatism in GOP leaders' refusal to pull out all the stops to advance a conservative agenda. He sees cowardice and an ulterior agenda-- to conserve political capital to keep the party's corporate patrons well tended.

Cruz's frustration with GOP leadership boiled over in July when he denounced McConnell, on the Senate floor, as a "flat-out" liar who cuts "corrupt" deals while running a "government of the lobbyists, by the lobbyists and for the lobbyists."

Freedom Caucus members share Cruz's hatred of the Senate leader-- whose first name they practically spit as they say it. "Mitch McConnell is infinitely worse as a leader than Boehner," said Rep. Matt Salmon of Arizona. "He surrenders at the sight of battle every time."

Over the horizon, it's not difficult to imagine how the establishment GOP solves its Freedom Caucus problem-- by coming at these obstructionists with guns blazing. The Chamber of Commerce has vowed it will avenge Boehner by targeting uncooperative GOP House incumbents in the 2016 primaries, seeking to repeat its success of pacifying the GOP Senate. The establishment doesn't require total victory; it just needs to flip enough seats to assure the next Republican speaker a lockstep 218-vote majority.

But in the near term, America should brace for chaos-- with Republican infighting jeopardizing not only the nation's credit, but funding for our roads and bridges, our veterans and the most vulnerable among us. Boehner was a unique politician: the son of a barback, most at ease at the country club. "He had unique skills bridging irreconcilable groups of Republicans and averting utter disaster," says Ornstein, the congressional scholar. "Nobody else, starting with Kevin McCarthy, has the ability to do it." The Freedom Caucus members have been emboldened by their coup, and anti-establishment presidential candidates will egg them on. This tiny band of radicals-- who have built careers on hatred of government-- won't be deterred until they've shaken the very foundation of the people's House.

Is there a role for Democrats to play, aside from sitting back and eating popcorn? Well, there is. The Freedom Caucus membership list is semi-secret but several members have identified themselves publicly. As Dickinson wrote, most of them represent blood red, all-white gerrymandered districts-- many in the Old Confederacy. But there are 4 members of the Freedom Caucus who could be beaten by good Democrats. Unfortunately, this-- like everything else-- is beyond the capacity of Pelosi's utterly useless DCCC. But these are the guys who could be beaten by Democrats:

• Rod Blum (IA)- D+5
• Ron DeSantis (FL)- running for U.S. Senate
• Scott Garrett (NJ)- R+4
• Steve Pearce (NM)- R+5

The way Steve Israel and sock-puppet Ben Ray Luján are addressing this is by recruiting a wealthy Republican, Monica Vernon, to run as a Democrat against the former Speaker of the state House, progressive hero, Pat Murphy. The DCCC claims it's neutral in the primary but they are working hard to boost Vernon and sabotage-- very actively sabotage (more about that in a couple days)-- Murphy. Murphy would almost definitely beat Blum. Vernon's presence of the ballot as a Democrat would discourage Democrats from even bothering to come out to the polls. But that's the dumb-as-a-brick DCCC! You can help Pat here.

In Florida DeSantis has a tough primary against a couple of GOP squishes. The far right constituency groups are rallying around him and he has a good chance to win. This is the seat that Alan Grayson is running for. But instead of rallying around him, the DSCC has promised their Wall Street financiers to deliver the nomination to "ex"-Republican Patrick (not to be confused with "Pat") Murphy, a wealthy, pro-bankster New Dem who votes with the GOP and is not well-liked by the Democratic base. You can help Alan here.

In the New Jersey race, the DCCC dug up another rich, pitiful conservative, Josh Gottheimer, with no chance to beat Garrett and in sock puppet Luján's home state, they haven't even bothered to find a candidate to run against Pearce. Another wasted cycle from the Establishment DC Dems!

Republican Civil War Devastates One Party Politics In Red, Red Idaho-- Bad News For Labrador

Earlier today we poked around a little in the silliness around the House Republicans quest for an Eric Cantor replacement, a very key job in their obstructionist m.o. We thought the absurdity of Idaho libertarian Raúl Labrador would be the best palate cleanser after Cantor… but not one with even the vaguest of chances to beat the Kevin McCarthy wind-up doll. And whatever chance he may have had-- say one in ten thousand-- was further reduced as reports are an eruption of full scale civil war in Moscow leaked out today. Moscow, Idaho-- the site of this year's Idaho Republican Party convention.

Let's be clear, the last time a Democrat got elected to a federal office in the blood red state-- which elected just 13 Democrats out of 70 in the state House and gave Obama just 33% of its vote in 2012-- it was Blue Dog Walt Minnick in 2008, a former Nixonite who became a "Democrat" in 1996 and who was so far to the right that he almost never voted with Democrats on anything other than naming post offices. He was handily defeated (41.3% of the vote) by Labrador in 2010, after one pathetic term, which did help him get another job he was better suited for-- as a lobbyist for one of Washington's sleaziest firms, the Majority Group. Minnick was the only Democrat to ever receive a perfect score from the Club for Growth and the only congressional Democrat endorsed by the Tea Party, having voted against the Affordable Care Act, against Obama's Stimulus bill and against the clean energy act.

Labrador isn't an improvement, but he has been more interesting, not being part of the corrupt corporate Establishment that has rotted out the core of both Beltway-centric political parties. And he's very popular back hime-- or at least he was until yesterday, when he chaired the state convention.

Idaho’s state Republican Party convention degenerated into a fiasco Saturday after attempts to disqualify up to a third of the delegates attending appeared to be succeeding – and the convention ended up adjourning without electing a chairman, setting a platform or doing any of it scheduled business.

“For three weeks I’ve tried to broker a deal to prevent what happened today,” 1st District Idaho Congressman Raul Labrador told Idaho Public Television just after the convention adjourned, but he failed; Labrador was the convention chairman.

“It’s hard to blame all this on Raul Labrador, but on the other hand, this does not strengthen his credentials for a national leadership position, either,” said BSU professor emeritus Jim Weatherby, a longtime observer of Idaho politics.

Far from uniting the deeply divided party, the gathering in Moscow degenerated into dysfunction-- though it’s the party that holds every statewide office in Idaho, every seat in the congressional delegation and more than 80 percent of the seats in the state Legislature. It also proved not to be the finest hour for Labrador, whom many looked to as the healer for the fractured party just a day after he announced that he’s running for Majority Leader of the U.S. House; instead, he ended the convention facing jeers and walkouts from his own party members.

Weatherby said the only comparable event he could think of was Nevada’s GOP convention fiasco in 2008, which was canceled before delegates to the national convention had been selected. “And again, Ron Paul forces or libertarian forces were involved in that fiasco as well,” Weatherby said.

Libertarian and tea party forces had lost badly in most parts of the state in the May 20 Idaho GOP primary-- though they were ascendant in North Idaho-- but geared up to keep control of the party anyway at the state convention.

“There’s always been disagreement on platforms and things like that, but to go to the level they went to this time to disqualify people,” Sen. Chuck Winder, R-Boise, said wonderingly as he hit the road home after the convention Saturday. “People that have been around a long time don’t remember anything like this. … One person files a complaint, keeps 102 people from voting for no real grounds.”

The state Senate assistant majority leader said, “It was basically the ultra-, ultra-conservative, tea party libertarian type people basically flexing their muscle in the way the thing was organized.”

State Sen. Bob Nonini, R-Coeur d’Alene, made the motion to adjourn at 3 p.m. on Saturday; a challenge to the move failed, as many delegates walked out.

Melissa Davlin, an Idaho Public Television reporter who was in Moscow covering the event, said, “Both sides were just so fed up-- they were done.” She noted, “They had been through hours of parliamentary procedures and confusion over rules and all of these things, and they still weren’t getting anywhere.”

“I heard people on both sides say that this is the last time they’re going to come to a state convention,” Davlin said.

The failure of the convention means a full day of laboring Friday over resolutions, rules and platform planks was for naught. Committees had recommended resolutions to repeal Idaho’s state health insurance exchange, encourage Bible study in public schools and oppose Common Core state standards for student achievement, among others.

The platform committee had agreed on one major change in the party platform: Doing away with its current clause calling for repeal of the 17th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which requires direct election of U.S. senators. Repealing the amendment would return that choice to state legislatures, instead of voters.

State Rep. Brandon Hixon, R-Caldwell, who made the motion in the committee to remove the plank, said, “Idahoans want their voices to be heard. … I can’t imagine taking the voting power away from all 1.6 million people in Idaho and giving it to just 105 people in the Idaho Legislature to elect our United States senators.”

However, that plank will now stay in the state GOP platform for the next two years.

Who better to preside over the Republican descent into this kind of chaos and vitriol on a national basis than someone who already has in his own red hellhole of a state? Labrador for Republican Leader! Or Mayor of Moscow.

Republican Civil War Turning To Cannibalism?

DWT is for Raul Labrador

Angry right-wing populists struck out blindly against Eric Cantor last week-- and scored a knockout. But to the victors do not go the spoils, not Inside-the-Beltway. David Brat will become a largely ignored, probably short-term, backbencher; he will not become Majority Leader. Nor will any teabagger who celebrated Cantor's political demise. They won't even have a say in who replaces Cantor. Next in line in Boehnerland is the #3-ranking Republican, Kevin McCarthy (R-CA). A couple of ambitious standrad-issue GOP politicians-- Jeff Sessions, Jim Jordan, Jeb Hensarling-- made some muffled "Hey what about me, me, me" noises, but there was never any serious challenge to the status quo in the House leadership.

Free-thinker Justin Amash (R-MI) voiced frustration teabaggers feel about their inability to capitalize of Cantor's defeat: "The grass roots just removed our majority leader and we're going to replace him with someone who's part of the same system? I don't think that's going to satisfy conservatives at home."

The McCarthy forces-- i.e., the Republican Beltway Establishment-- had it all wrapped up before the angry/jubilant teabaggers had finished patting each other on the back. He had all the commitments he needed even before Amash's "whacko-bird" contingent put Idaho Republican Raúl Labrador, who was back home-- fortuitously enough, with Rand Paul-- for the Idaho Republican Party convention. Voicing the seething anger many backbenchers feel about the Boehner-Cantor-McCarthy top-down leadership style, Labrador explained he's quixotic run this way: "It's the leadership that makes every single decision, and we as members of Congress just have to abide by what the leadership tells us to do. And I think this is why I'm doing it." That's the most the teabaggers will get out of their defeat of Cantor.

One of the big Tea Party groups, Matt Kibbe's FreedomWorks, which is pretty much despised among Establishment Republican corporatists, is backing Labrador. "Americans," said Kibbe, "deserve a choice in leadership, and Republicans should have learned by now that 'the next guy in line' isn’t entitled to the next rung on the ladder. Raúl Labrador is the perfect leadership choice for constitutional conservatives who are ready to shake things up in Congress. He has an authentic commitment to rejecting special interests and defending limited government."

Former National Review editor Robert Costa, now at the Washington Post, is one of the best sources of behind the scenes news from the GOP. Friday he wrote that "McCarthy’s apparent easy ascent as unrest swirled around him underscores how the tea party, even with its strong pull in congressional primaries and ability to dictate the Republican agenda, remains a limited force in the insular and relationship-driven sphere of House GOP politics. Though sizable in numbers, they lack the organization and preparation, the battle-tested aides and the Machiavellian instincts to take over. That has left the tea party in the paradoxical position of being powerful enough to take out a majority leader in historic fashion but powerless to replace him. As a result, a blue-state Republican who is more moderate than the one he is likely to replace-- McCarthy supports giving legal status to undocumented immigrants, for instance-- was set to rise… On Twitter and elsewhere, conservative activists were in disbelief, wondering how McCarthy had so rapidly become the presumptive victor."

Former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele predicted that the conservative base outside Congress could soon revolt, potentially lashing out against McCarthy as the latest example of hubris by a leadership team that should have been more humbled by Cantor’s defeat: “The grass-roots conservatives aren’t going to sit back and let this moment pass them by. Whether that happens next week or in the next few months is the question.”

Regardless of how they react or how the whip race plays out, the lingering question for House conservatives will be why they weren’t ready for an opening they’ve been fighting for since they helped Republicans regain power in the tea party wave of 2010

The most the congressional and grassroots teabaggers can hope for would be for one of their own to replace McCarthy in the #3 slot as Whip. The Establishment candidate is Peter Roskam-- from a vulnerable R+4 Illinois district and who would be fighting for his political life if DCCC Chairman Steve Israel wasn't protecting him. A couple of further right candidates, Steve Scalise (R-LA) and Marlin Stutzman (R-IN) are trying to wave the Tea Party banner in the race. Sessions is also making noises about jumping into this one now that he jumped out of the Majority Leader race. They're all disparaging Roskam as another untrustworthy blue state Republican. He responded with a dear colleague letter:

In my three-and-a-half years as Chief Deputy Whip, I have worked and learned alongside you in the difficult skirmishes on spending, on healthcare, on taxes, and above all on government intrusion and heavy handedness in a dizzying number of areas of our public and private lives. We haven’t always played smart. We haven’t always worked as a team. In some situations, we haven’t scored any points, or won the match. This has been a deeply frustrating experience to watch our economy and our core values backslide under the onslaught of President Obama and Harry Reid’s class warfare and welfare state agenda. But I’m here to tell you, we don’t have to live this way.

Yes, I am from Illinois, the birthplace of Reagan and the Land of Lincoln and I’m a passionate, committed conservative from a red district. By definition, the Whip job is collaborative, and has to draw on relationships that transcend boundaries and groups. At this tumultuous time for our Conference, I think it is more important to have the skills necessary to line up votes than to check a geographical box. We can and should ensure the broadest possible voices in the Conference are heard and get the best candidate with the best abilities in the Majority Whip post. That’s why I am committing to you that should I be entrusted with the Majority Whip responsibility, my Chief Deputy Whip will be from a red state. The Chief Deputy position is essential to winning on the Floor against the Democrats, and to winning in the Congress against President Obama, it isn’t a mere bargaining chip. Additionally, I intend to organize a Deputy Whip operation taking careful consideration of regional balance to ensure robust dialogue and representation. The Majority Whip race is about the person who has the best ability to engage our Members, to advocate for conservative ideas, and to drive our colleagues in the fight to stop Obama Administration policies and to enact our smart, conservative ideals.

Amash made his support for Labrador official yesterday in a press release:

"The majority leader’s main job is to set the agenda for House Republicans. We must have a solid conservative set that agenda, or we’ll risk being out of step with our constituents," said Amash. "Raúl Labrador is uniquely prepared to be a conservative voice on the Republican leadership team and to articulate and defend our principles in the media. I can think of no one more qualified to be our next leader."

"Washington Republicans can bury what happened last Tuesday with piles of excuses. But if they view Tuesday as an anomaly, they do so at their own peril," continued Amash. "Ordinary Americans are frustrated that their representatives aren’t listening to them. They desperately want Republican leadership they can identify with, that speaks to their beliefs, and that will forcefully make our case going into the next term."

"We can’t respond to a stunning loss by giving a pat on the back and promotion to the same team. It’s time for someone new, someone conservative, someone who will put forward a fresh agenda, and someone we know is a proven and talented spokesman. That man is Raúl Labrador."

It's worth noting that Boehner's top political allies, the Chamber of Commerce, is working against Tea Party incumbents and is campaigning against 2 in Michigan, Kerry Bentivolio and, not surprisingly, Amash.

Their Own Private Idaho

Yesterday was primary day for Idaho. And yesterday we looked at the lack of momentum for teabagger candidates in California GOP primary campaigns. Turns out to have been a different story in Idaho... kind of. First off, Idaho is a country unto itself. This place is so extreme right that the teabaggers actually endorsed the Blue Dog Democratic incumbent, Walt Minnick! In the other district, ID-02, Mike Simpson, who was first elected in 1998, was deemed insufficiently right-wing-- and, like so many of the corporate whores who utterly dominate the Republican congressional establishment, he voted for Bush's no-strings-attached Wall Street bailout while taking campaign "contributions" (legalistic, veiled bribes) from the banksters he was voting to bail out. He was targeted by teabaggers for his TARP vote and managed to eke out an embarrassing 55% win.

But the real action was in Minnick's district, where two right-wing extremists were vying for the GOP nod to take him on. First of all, it's important to remember that both-- Raul Labrador and Vaughn Ward-- would be considered stark raving mad (if not dangerous) anywhere else in the U.S. outside of South Carolina, Arizona and Texas. What made the race interesting is that Ward was endorsed by the NRCC and by Sarah Palin and that Labrador was endorsed by a gang of local teabaggers-- different ones from the teabaggers who had endorsed Minnick. So Ward had all the GOP institutional support and all the corrupt cash flowing his way. That turned out to have worked against him as Labrador rolled over him 48-39% in what the GOP Establishment considers an upset.

On election day Ward had tried putting one over on the voters by claiming-- falsely-- he had been endorsed by Idaho wing nut Senator Mike Crapo. Crapo publicly denounced the tactic and demanded a retraction. And that was just one of many mishaps that doomed Ward's harebrained campaign.

Ward, the establishment favorite, had a six-to-one money advantage over Labrador, and had a heavy television presence while Labrador ran only radio spots. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin also campaigned for Ward in the closing days of the race.

But Ward made several missteps in the campaign. In a debate with Labrador he declared that Puerto Rico was not a part of the U.S. When Labrador, who was born in Puerto Rico, corrected him, Ward responded: “I really don’t care what it is, it doesn’t matter.”

Ward also faced plagiarism allegations on his campaign Web site and in his speeches. Politico reported that Ward’s kick-off campaign speech in January closely mirrored that of President Barack Obama’s 2004 speech at the Democratic National Convention.

He was also dinged by the Pentagon for appearing in uniform in a campaign ad, and was forced to take down the ad.

Blue America won't be taking a stand in the general election in this race, pitting two clueless reactionaries, Minnick and Labrador-- each endorsed by a different faction of teabagging imbeciles-- against each other. The only good outcome would be an old fashioned duel... with both successful.